October 14, 2015

Tiramisu cheesecake

I was missing something here on the blog for quite some time and then it hit me; where was all the food? To make up for the lack of food, I thought I'd share this yummy cheesecake recipe. I'll have to admit that I never tried to make cheesecake before (I'm not a big fan of cheese) but there's a first time for everything and it was an immediate hit at my home. I think my mom ate whole the cake already. This cheesecake really captures the typical tiramisu taste very well. Want to find out how I made it? Keep on reading!

Ingredients

70 g butter, melted

200 g madeira cookies (or the regular 'boudoir' cookies)

almond essence (if desired)

700 g mascarpone (or other cream cheese)

3 eggs, yolks and whites separated

150 g granulated sugar

30 g all purpose flour

50 ml rhum

1/2 ts vanilla extract

175 g chocolate

3 tbs amaretto

Preparation

Crush the cookies in a bowl with a pestle and add the melted butter. Mix it all up and add the almond essence if desired. Dump the mixture in your baking tin and press down really well. Put in the refrigerator for at least half an hour.

In the meantime, you can work on your filling. Beat the mascarpone in a mixer until it's creamy. Add the sugar and continue beating. When it's well blended, add the egg yolks as well and continue mixing everything until it's light and fluffy.

Divide this mixture into two bowls. Start melting the chocolate au bain marie. While the chocolate is melting you can whip up the egg whites until they're stiff. After this is done, you can continue with one of two bowls.

In one bowl, add the flour, rhum and vanilla extract and mix well. Then, gently fold in one half of the egg whites as well. Don't be too hard on the egg whites, they make it all nice and fluffy. If it seems lumpy, don't worry; everything will work out find in the end.

Then, if the chocolate has melted, add the amaretto to it and whisk under the mixture in the other bowl. Add the other half of the egg whites to this mixture, using the same technique as before. Now, you'll have one chocolate mixture (this one) and one vanilla (the other one - obviously).

Preheat the oven to 175°C and take the bottom of the cheesecake out of the fridge. Start filling the cheesecake by first pouring in part of the vanilla mixture. Then, pour in part of the chocolate mixture and then part of the vanilla mix, and so on and so on until everything is in the baking tin.

If you want a marble effect, you can take a toothpick or a knife and make different strokes in the dough. Don't overdo it though.

Put in the oven for 45 to 50 - maybe 55 minutes. The middle of the cake won't be completely baked, but don't worry; that's the point. Let the cheesecake cool down in the oven for another 15 minutes before you take it out. After it's completely cooled down, put in the fridge and let it sit there for a couple of hours before serving it.